TROUT UNLIMTED
When Ted Turner slips like Heraclitus into his favorite stretch of cold water—in his case, a twisting swirl of Cherry Creek known as “The Butler”—he’ll be casting for some of the rarest fishes in Montana.
The stream he encounters this year, however, is not the same one as last. Giddy at the prospect of coaxing westslope cutthroat trout to rise, he regards the glittery transplants as pieces in a larger biological jigsaw puzzle.
“As good as it will be to catch these fish,” he says. “I’ll feel even better every time I turn them back into their new home and watch their numbers grow.”
Some 65 liquid miles have become a new protected stronghold for pure-strain westslopes that did not exist two years ago. Originating in the rugged snow-fed hinters of Cherry Lake in the Gallatin National Forest, and then tumbling west toward a confluence with the Madison River, the lion’s share of the drainage resides on Turner’s Flying D Ranch.
Restoring native westslopes is part of Turner’s ongoing commitment to landscape-level conservation. The Flying D, his 113,000-acre flagship, is emblematic of how the former media mogul has made his lands available, like Noah and his ark, to harbor species in need of secure habitat.
